Cruise - Travel

WDW Florida - Christmas and NY 2010/2011

Disney World Christmas and New Year Celebrations 2010

Barn Construction - Before and After #2

A few pictures this time from the interior - specifically the hallway. We had 4 main things on our wish list as we started work on this area. 1) That the original stonework would be visible where possible 2) Chunky oak floating staircase 3) High ceiling for a big chandelier. 4) Visible Beams

There were no rooms of any description inside already - we had to create/imagine/design the lot with the help of an architect, a lot of imagination and a balsa wood model (which helped enormously). We did have a great Building Control Officer at the local council who was always available to help us through any tricky problems.

We built a set of temporary stairs so we could work on all the levels without climbing up and down ladders - this also allowed us to get a feel for how the final construction would look

The stairs are solid oak timbers thinned down to a few inches in thickness and then sandwiched and bolted together - they weigh an absolute ton. Hidden steel plates support them from below and secure them to both the wall and a central beam; the effect is they sort of float an inch or two from the wall and dont seem to be attached. We then had the safety glass cut to size and came up with a method of holding it in position without resorting the use of those commercial looking chrome fittings.

Barn Construction - before and after.

Just been sorting through some old photos from the start of the build. These are from 2011 and focus on the front (the west side). We had just started erecting the scaffolding around the south of the barn ready to pull it down and have begun the trench work to get the electricity into the building so we didn't have to use a noisy generator to power all the equipment.

Windows had always been something we thought a lot about. The local planning office would only allow us to keep the original opening sizes. After constructing an example frame from oak we found a local joiner to create the rest. They were finally painted on the outside in F&B French Gray exterior eggshell with the inside just treated in Osmo wood oil to show off the wood grain.

We kept the render on the front and painted it cream just to give some contrast and break up the amount of solid stone. Speaking of which we left all the stone naturally weathered but we removed all of the thick grey mortar pointing and replaced it with a lime based mix.